US: Snowden should return to US, face charges

[DonViejo]

Source: AP/via Salon

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House says a National Security Agency official who suggested the U.S. consider granting Edward Snowden asylum was expressing his personal opinion.

White House spokesman Jay Carney says President Barack Obama’s position hasn’t changed. He says Snowden faces felony charges and should be returned to the U.S. Carney says Snowden would be afforded due process if returned from Russia, which has granted him temporary asylum.

Carney’s comments came after NSA official Richard Ledgett said it was worth discussing asylum for Snowden under the right conditions.

Ledgett heads the task force assessing the damage from Snowden’s leaks. He said he’d need assurances that the rest of the data Snowden stole could be secured to prevent further leaks. He told CBS News the bar for those assurances would be high.

###



Read more: http://www.salon.com/2013/12/17/us_snowden_should_return_to_us_face_charges/

[L0oniX]

1. Spank!

[billhicks76]

6. And Our Government Should Stop Lying To Us

But it ain't happening. The gall of these people. Government is of and by the people and these frauds seem to have forgotten that. No one on either side of the aisle has any faith left in our institutions. That leads to nowhere good.

[Javaman]

22. +1 nt

[L0oniX]

50. What would you expect from a government that has no problem with lying us into a war?

[Lenomsky]

54. Never expected OBAMA to to tow the Dubya line .. the damn shame!

Had such high hopes for Obama and America but seems I was somewhat misguided.

Oh well best get used to it I suppose be moving to US in the next few years.

[billhicks76]

56. I Did

...but not until well into 2008 primary season. The reason? Obama completely flip-flopped and betrayed his promise to campaign against giving the telecoms immunity. He even said he would filibuster. Then inexplicably he voted for the bill before the election. I knew they had gotten to him. Who knows what conversations the NSA had on him back through 2003 or 2004. NSA whistleblower Russ Tice said on TV that he was ordered to tap Obama in 2004 as well as various supreme court judges, federal judges, federal prosecutors, military officers, members of the intelligence committees in Congress and journalists. This is Darth Vader type of stuff .

[Cleita]

2. Only after Chelsea Manning gets a clean record, an honorable discharge

and walks free. She should also get a medal but I guess that's asking for too much. Snowden should be very suspicious of any olive branches offered to him.

[cstanleytech]

4. Why should Manning be freed? After all Manning did have a completely legal way

in the military to report something illegal (not sure if Snowden had the same option though) by contacting someone in congress and or by contacting the Inspector Generals office I believe but choose not to do so and instead decided to break the law regarding the handling of classified material.

[Cleita]

9. Manning tried to expose what has become a corrupt institution,

our military, that has essentially been subverted to be used as mercenaries by our global oil industrialists, thanks to Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and the rest of those players in our sorry Mideast meddling.

She should get a medal for being a real American patriot.

[cstanleytech]

18. I thought Mannings motives were to expose something illegal?

If that was purely the motive then why not use the method thats legal rather than the method thats clearly and knowingly illegal?

[Cleita]

23. You're serious?

Even I know from being a bookkeeping drone in a corporate culture, you just don't go to the CEO when you figure out he's been embezzling from the company.

[JDPriestly]

32. I once reported a superior that was doing all kinds of unethical things, violating the rules,

to the boss. Guess what? We both got fired. I'm still glad because I know I did the right thing, and the company would have been in big legal trouble had I not refused to follow instructions and had I not reported the wrongdoing. But whistleblowing is a very risky business.

[Cleita]

52. It sure is and I have been transferred to other departments for

reporting race discrimination to human resources in a university I worked in. My point is you can't report wrongdoing to the entity doing the wrongdoing, in Manning's case the military. He did make the secret documents public, which is all he could do because to go through legal channels would have resulted in a cover up and him being punished somehow.

[Veilex]

30. Because the legal method isn't about rectifying problems...

Its about covering them up at the lowest levels possible.
I have some direct experience with that.

[Ash_F]

35. Manning went to his superiors about a a group of Iraqis he had been tasked to investigate

who were protesting financial corruption in the al-Maliki regime and found themselves hunted by the US military for spreading "anti-Iraqi literature". He was told to "drop it"

The 'proper channels' did not work. Your rhetoric falls flat in the face of what actually happened and the reality how our military presently functions. Do you seriously think the inspector general or a congressman would have made everything right?

How can Democrats, with a straight face, decry the abridgment of free speech in nations such as North Korea, and yet bring that same level of oppression down on an occupied vassal?

[ucrdem]

36. Sure he did.

That's more or less what he's supposed to have testified to in his court martial hearing, per the Nation, per FireDogLake writer Kevin Gosztola, March 20, 2013, who simply says "his superior officer did not want to hear about it:"

http://www.thenation.com/article/173447/bradley-manning-tried-warn-us-about-crisis-iraq-will-we-listen-him-now#

People say lots of fine things after they've been coached by their attorneys for a few months, but what bradass told Adrian Mano in their web chat of May 21, 2010, was this:

(12:52:33 PM) bradass87: Hilary Clinton, and several thousand diplomats around the world are going to have a heart attack when they wake up one morning, and finds an entire repository of classified foreign policy is available, in searchable format to the public… =L

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/07/manning-lamo-logs/

[Ash_F]

37. That comment was cute and everything.

But it doesn't answer my question as to why it is OK for Democrats to allow the abridgment of free speech of these Iraqis, among the many other human rights violations uncovered by Manning.

[ucrdem]

40. The words "speech," "Iraq," and "Iraqi" do not appear once in the chat log.

The word "rights" appears once:

(9:27:04 AM) bradass87: americans have so many more rights than non-americans

I'll grant that Manning might have had some very dim sense of injustice but he seems a hell of a lot more interested in making trouble for the current Democratic administration and helping Assange do the same.

[Ash_F]

42. What a cowardly dodge. /nt

[ucrdem]

43. Sorry to spoil your sugarplum.

As far I can tell Wikileaks is basically a gigantic dog whistle and it's unfortunate that Manning got himself mixed up in it. Ditto Snowden.

[Ash_F]

44. Anything to avoid discussing the real issues, right?

I find it disappointing that media and public discourse is so focused on the personalities surrounding the wikileaks fiasco and whether they are to be loved or hated, rather than the serious policy issues that it uncovered, such as the aforementioned political oppression by the US military, child sex trafficking by military contractors, extrajudicial killings and so on and so forth.

Snowden and Manning may be interesting to talk about, but ultimately they are only individuals and the scope of their plight pales in comparison the number of victims created by bad government policy.

So I guess you have no problem with the military jailing Iraqi's for spreading 'anti-Iraqi' literature? How about the Virginia based security company who was caught trafficking child sex slaves? The military and State Department seemed ok enough with it. The State department even told the Afghans to keep quiet about it.

Do you think that is good policy? Do you think these activities are something that Democrats should support?

[ucrdem]

47. Yeah but that's the whole raison d'être of wikileaks and NSAgate.

They have no connection to actual policy. They're media creations or more accurately PR operations designed to distract and confuse, and the heroic blond choirboys pursued by the evil Kenyan are part of the act. I figured that out long ago.

[cstanleytech]

45. One issue does not equal a get out of jail card for breaking the law though.

Also you seem to be forgetting all the other information Manning released that had nothing to do with any coverup of a crime, how exactly was exposing that particular information exposing a crime?
Dont get me wrong, I'm willing to give Manning credit for the helicopter footage release because that incident was known and not releasing the video did no good but otherwise Manning really did screw up Ash.

[another_liberal]

3. Chelsea Manning might advise him differently.

So would I.

[Autumn]

5. I would think Snowden is smart enough not to buy a used car from

these people, much less take a "deal" from them

[George II]

7. Thankfully Richard Ledgett isn't in a position to grant asylum to anyone.

[msongs]

8. should be court dates available after the bush/cheney trials :-) nt

[on point]

10. Only After Bush and co-conspirators are prosecuted for torture and war crimes

[cstanleytech]

19. Bush not being prosecuted for his crimes are not a valid defense over why

someone else shouldnt be prosecuted for their own crimes.
Oh and for the record I do agree with you that he (Bush) should be prosecuted but I doubt it will ever happen because the US has never gone after a former president for things they did in office, take Nixon for example he was able to escape any prosecution.

[on point]

41. It does point out the double standard though? The state is above the law, those it oppresses

need the full boot?

By the way, I think Snowden deserves the Medal of freedom for his service to the country - not prosecution.

Chelsea Manning also deseerves the country's thnaks, not prosecution.

After all, it was the Allies (inlcuding the USA), thst made the point in Nurenberg, that one cannot simply 'follow orders' but must exercise independent judgement and act to stop a crime (Snowden), or expose a crime (Manning)

[hobbit709]

11. Just how stupid do they think Snowden is?

[Demeter]

39. It's the rest of us they think stupid

They KNOW Snowden is a genius.

So do we. And we aren't stupid, either.

[Psephos]

55. exactly n/t

[Swede Atlanta]

12. Hey BO and Carney

Go Cheney yourselves......

If the U.S. government was not unconstitutionally spying on Americans this wouldn't be an issue.

BO and his henchmen following in the footsteps of GWB and Darth Cheney continue to pursue a policy of growing the size of the "dark" government (i.e. the part of the government that Congress has to vote for but over which it has no meaningful oversight). It is the "trust me you need this" part of the government.

Snowden is a hero to the world for exposing the crimes of the current administration. Heads should be rolling and people in handcuffs facing a judge and jury but we have been scared. We have been scared into believing that the threat of a terrorist attack is more dangerous than losing privacy not to mention our 4th Amendment rights.

The booooogey man will get you if I don't record everyone of your phone calls and keep all of your e-mails and every website you ever visit and how many times a day you flush your toilet.

I feel no more secure with all this crap than if we had none of it.

[pipoman]

13. I think they should let him alone. .

If he is imprisoned he will be a martyr and will incite a lot of people. .

[happyslug]

14. The US may HAVE to give Snowden a full pardon.....

The US has to contain the damage done by these links and the first step is to find out what was actually leaked. The only person who knows that to any degree is Snowden, thus the US to contain this lost of data has to talk to Snowden. Snowden will only talk if he gets a pardon. All Snowden has to do is hold out for a Pardon, and it will be granted if the US really wants to know what he leaked.

There are people in the CIA, the NSA and the White House who hates this idea, but it is coming. What Snowden can provide will NOT prevent more information from coming out, that is already gone, but for the US to get a good idea of WHAT was leaked so the US can minimize the damage.

[Zorro]

17. Dream on

[happyslug]

48. Then how does the US know what data is going to be released?

That is the issue, unless the US already knows what is to be released, then the only person who knows what is out there in Snowden. To contain any harm the release of such data means, requires the US to know what is going to be released. Thus unless the US already knows what is to be released, the US needs Snowden. The price for his cooperation will be a full pardon.

This came up when a US Military Aircraft went up the wrong valley and cut an Italian cable car.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavalese_cable_car_disaster_(1998)

At the time of the accident, the comments was a full amnesty should have been granted so the Pilots could testify what happened. Instead a court martial was held, the Pilots found not guilty of manslaughter. Then an Amnesty was granted and one pilot stated that they had destroyed a video tape on the day of the flight. Based on that evidence another trial was held, this time convicting the pilot who destroyed the tape of destroying evidence. Please note the only reason this came up was an AMNESTY had been given.

At times, you need the data more then you need to convict someone. In the case of Snowden, the US may need to know WHAT he released, more then they need to punish him for releasing that data. If that is the case a pardon is called for. This is NOT out of kindness but reality. The US has to know what is out there so the US can address it.

[cstanleytech]

21. I dont see a full pardon being granted. A partial one with a plea deal on the number of years

Snowden will have to either serve in prison and or be on parole are probably more likely imo.

[Cleita]

25. Or maybe he will have to stay in Russia for awhile. n/t

[happyslug]

49. See my post #48

The problem is I do NOT see an Amnesty out of the goodness of anyone's heart, but the cold hearted desire to know what may hit the US. Unless the US already knows what Snowden released, the only person who can provide that is Snowden, and I do NOT see him agreeing to anything less then a full pardon.

[Phlem]

15. OK then,

thanks for playing.

There's a complimentary pair of cement shoes for your vacation to the Caribbean on your Newww YYYacht!

Ta dada da... ta dada da... ta dada da da...

Confetti and and sparklers everywhere!!

Ta dada da... ta dada da... ta dada da da...




-p

[RoccoR5955]

16. No, Snowden should return to the US

and get a Medal of Honor. Whatever the highest honor is, he should get!

[SpcMnky]

20. He Should Be in the Witness Protection Program, but some, I suppose, would see this otherwise...

[nikto]

24. Remember this?

Keep this event from the "Saddam Era" in mind...

http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/9602/saddam_daughters/6p/



You can "trust", but can you verify?

[Phlem]

26. I know right!

Cause he's just not truthful and transparent

Ta dada da
Ta dada da da......

-p

[christx30]

27. Snowden: The US can pucker up

And kiss my ass. I'm not stupid enough to turn myself in and trust a corrupt justice system. Go to hell.

[1000words]

28. Pretty sure Snowden couldn't give a shit what the U.S. government thinks

Sitting in the catbird seat gives you that option.

[blkmusclmachine]

29. POLICE STATE

[JDPriestly]

31. Snowden should remember that police use offers of light sentences to get cooperation from

defendants. But judges sentence you, not the police officers.

These offers are worthless in my opinion.

[ucrdem]

33. Ledgett is probably feeling pressure from Snowden's family.

I don't see the harm in throwing them a bone or two as I happen to agree that Snowden has been badly used by whatever Neocon outfit is running this thing. But it's up to Holder which means it's up to Obama and I see no benefit in granting Snowden a pardon so until President Palin takes office it it ain't happening.

[Nanjing to Seoul]

34. I'm reminded of the movie Silverado:

Well, Mal. . .we'll give you a fair trial, followed by a first class hangin'.

[Demeter]

38. This deserves the rudest reply possible

Consider it said.


If I were Snowden, I'd say I'll come back after you face war crime charges, crimes against humanity charges, and impeachment for violating the constitutional rights of every American.

[madrchsod]

46. snowden ain't coming back to the usa

he`ll go to brazil if the brazilians allow him. i doubt the living conditions in russia is not at all to his liking. after all russia's security state is worse than ours.

[happyslug]

51. Russia in not a bad place to live if you have a little money

It has beaches on the Black Sea and right now considered the best place to be a computer hacker (Access to the internet is easy to obtain, and no one is enforcing any laws from outside Russia). Yes, it gets cold in the Winter, but heat can be obtained. Russia has a growing number of automobiles. The number of cars per 1000 residents in Russia is 293, exceeding Mexico at 275, and close to Argentina at 314, Saudi Arabia at 336 and Israel at 346 cars per 1000 people.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_vehicles_per_capita

As to Computer, the US went from less then one computer per 100 people to 35 computers per 100 people between 1981 and 1996. Russia went from less then one computer in 1993 to 13 in 2006 (another 13 year period). Computers in Russia has really boomed after 2006 (that is provided the numbers are correct, Russia is well known to undercount things). 2006 is last year I found Computer numbers for:

http://www.econstats.com/wdi/wdiv_597.htm

Now Brazil in 2006 had 16 computers to 100 people, but I have NOT heard of a massive computer increase as I have heard about Siberia over the last 7 years (I use 7 for 2006 is the last year of complete numbers for most countries that I am citing): I am sorry, a nerd like Snowden may perfer Siberia to Brazil.

http://www.econstats.com/wdi/wdic_BRA.htm


GINI index is 43:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=post&forum=1014&pid=674890

The US GINI index is 40

Brazil GINI Indoex is 60

The lower the GINI index the more equal is income. Thus Russia has slightly less income equality then the US.

2% of the Population of Russia lives on less then $2 a day, compared to 12% of Brazils. 5% of the population of Russia live under its won definition of Poverty. Compared to 16% of the US population and 20% in Brazil.

US Poverty rate:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/06/us-usa-economy-poverty-idUSBRE9A513820131106

Russian poverty rate:
http://www.econstats.com/wdi/wdic_RUS.htm

Brazil's poverty rate:
http://www.econstats.com/wdi/wdic_BRA.htm

Yes, Russia is NOT the US or Western Europe, but it is on par with Latin American and most of Asia and as a whole better then Africa or Brazil. Thus Brazil may NOT be that attractive to him. From what I gather he is a computer geek, and as such would prefer the Computer geeks out of Siberia then the hot ladies on the beaches of Rio (and you can get a hot blond Russian woman cheap now a days, that is if the Russian Secret Police don't provide him one to pump him for information).

Sorry, you may want to go to Brazil, I do not see Snowden perferring Brazil to Siberia.

[Orsino]

53. Their trial balloon failed, so they are pretending it wasn't a trial balloon.

Please update your catechism, Citizen.